Ti, who is head of MCA’s religious harmony bureau, said among them were heads of departments and local councils, executive councillors and Umno leaders.

“They and other non-Malay parents have told me they prefer sending their children to international schools or Chinese schools because they want their children to have a good command of either English or Mandarin.

“They feel there is more commercial value in it. A lot of them want their children to learn Mandarin so that they can easily do business with China or be good in English to move up the corporate ladder,” he told FMT, when commenting on a research paper showing that Chinese-medium schools might become more mainstream and more multiracial.